Fernseh-Pils-a-thon 2013

I did it sober. At work.

 

I saw this in a REWE supermarket today. For Germany it stays open a long time each day… until midnight, which doesn't see like much to an American used to his "land of convenience," but here all supermarkets closed at 8 pm until just a few years ago, when REWE suddenly decided to stay open until 10 pm… ooooh.

Still, it's a big store, about the size of the grocery side of a Walmart. I thought it might have an interesting beer or 2 to buy… stuck out there. But, I saw the funniest thing offered by Warsteiner. If you buy a case of their Pils, you got this attached to the top:

I'm not sure what it is, but Gratis means FREE. Someone had opened one of these packages and this is what I took a pic of:



I applaud the packaging as being… "innovative" and "creative," but what the hell is this? Well, Wiki states "Warsteiner has been a product of the Cramer family since 1753."

So that clears up the meaning, but what's inside the can? Beer I hope. According to their site, this is their normal beer in aluminum cans designed by artists. Enjoy the videos on the site…. ROFL.

 

Not far at all.

 

Here's a thread that needs updating for 2014: Saw this in a Lidl supermarket. I had to laugh. Hope y'all do, too.


The Fass mich an is a double word play. Fass is a "keg," and anfassen as a verb means "grab" so Fass mich an means "keg me" and "grab me."



I guess this is no different than American beer marketing, eh?

 

Not much different from American "craft" or macro beer marketing...

 

Also stick anything "craft" in a can these days and beer geeks lose their shit....

 

Just wait until they start adding:

Craft Beer with 65% More WOW!

 

The difference is that Clown Shoes and Surly Brewing are I'm sure much much better beer than Grafenwalder, which is basically the Lidl non-brand brand contract brewed and not much on flavour. At least with the American counterparts, the marketing is serving to make a quality product stand out, whereas these Fass mich an is simply a gimmick to get idiots to buy cheap-ass crap beer.

Here's a pic of the price sign, which I forgot to include in the original post. 5.49€ for 5L. That's the equivalent of 55 cents per 0.5L bottle.

 

I'll take the 5.49 Euro Partyfass over a $7.99 bomber of my local "craft" German style any day. There's crap on both sides of the "great beer divide."

 

I would assume so. Seeing as the dates on the packages are the same. Otherwise they'd have non-pasteurized canned/bottled locally, and then pasteurized Pilsner Urquell in the can/bottle send to the US. Doesn't seem to make sense to me, but what do I know? (Spoiler alert.......nothing).

 

Picked up a six pack of the "best by NOV-14-14" Pilsner Urquell, so the date is slightly different than yours @mjtierney2. Not sure about the ones you received from the gift shop, but these are in 12 oz. bottles.

Tastes good to me, crisp beer, solid hop bitterness. Slight diacetyl, which I always pick up in Pilsner Urquell (more so on draft for some reason) but it works with this beer, as it's not overpowering. According to the best buy this is about three months old, and this is my local so I know it's been kept refrigerated the entire time.

 

Very interesting thread. I am a German brewer and have worked in 6 German breweries including Rothaus. Yes, the beers have changed significantly in the past 20 years. In general, the Stammwürze (original gravity) and IBU (hop bitterness) continue to decrease. Not too long ago, a decent Pils had at least 12° Plato OG and 35 IBU´s. Compare that to today´s watery Pilsners with OG´s in the low 11´s or even high 10´s and IBU´s in the 20´s and the difference becomes clear. The reduction in the OG has a massive effect on the body of the beer, in its depth and complexity. When the OG is reduced, the IBU´s are also decreased to balance the reduced malt sweetness. If you start with a lower OG but still want to obtain around 5% alc. by volume, you must push the fermentation farther and reduce the residual sweetness resulting again in a thinner tasting beer. Aroma hops are completely missing from any Fernsehbier. The reason for these changes is quite clear: maximize profit by using less ingredients. Is this a reduction in quality? Absolutely. In any large brewery, the bean counters are in charge, not the brewmasters. That is the main reason why Das Reinheitsgebot is still so important. If the bean counters have their way and you do not have a RHG, then it is off to the races with adjuncts like high fructose corn syrup, rice extract, sugar cane, etc. Never believe that brewmasters around the world do not know how to brew great beer because they all do but are not allowed to. The art of brewing has been perfected and the equipment standardized. In Germany, the beers are being produced as cheaply as possible within the confines of the RHG. I remember very well Pilseners like König and Fürstenberg back in the 80´s and I cannot believe how much they have been degraded. We get the typical excuses from the big brewers: marketing to a younger crowd, appealing to women, adjusting to socio-economic factors. The truth is that they are making cheap beer and are hoping to get away with it as the generations shift and people like me are no longer around. Germany needs something like the English CAMRA before it is too late.

 

Great input Herr Felsen. Let's take the story one step further. As the "brand name" beers dumb down their beers over the years, removing all distinction of a higher quality, they become closer in quality to the "Preiseinstiegssegment", or as the folk says, Billigbier (cheap beer). Consumers are not dumb and ask themselves why they should pay twice the price for a crate of Fernsehbier which might be minimally better, if at all, and then you have the perfect storm which has been going on for almost 2 decades. How many times have you seen a guy in the Getraenkemarkt buy a crate of Krombacher AND a case of Billigbier? He serves the expensive beer when people come to visit.

The "craft beer" movement is a small light on the horizon for the German brewing industry, otherwise I do not know how they will ever defeat this vicious cycle.

 

What happened in Germany in 1993 that changed the beer market so drastically? The new Biersteuergesetz (beer tax law) took effect and eliminated the beer classifications laid out by previous laws. First, what is beer tax? This is money that a brewer pays to the government based on the amount of beer he produces. This is nothing new and has been going on in Germany for the past 700 years at least. Of all the things that Europe has agreed upon, beer tax has not been one of them and the ways of measuring it and how much you must pay vary widely from country to country:

http://www.brewersofeurope.org/docs/publications/BED2012.pdf

Before 1993, German brewers had four beer tax categories. These were based on the Original Gravity of the wort (percent of fermentables in solution before fermentation expressed in degrees Plato or °P), not the alcohol concentration of the beer after fermentation. The degree of attenuation and resulting alcohol in the finished beer did not and still does not matter for tax purposes:

• 2.0–5.5 percent was Einfachbier,
• 7.0–8.0 percent was Schankbier,
• 11.0–14.0 percent was Vollbier and
• 16.0+ percent was Starkbier.

The beer tax that you paid was based on your beer tax category, i.e. if you made a beer with 13.7% OG (13.7°P), you paid the Vollbier rate. You paid the same tax rate for a beer with 11.1% OG (11.1°P). This all changed in 1993 when the new law required brewers to pay tax per degree Plato OG. In 1993, that amount was 1.54 German Marks which today translates to 0.787 Euros per hectoliter (100 liters) per degree Plato of beer produced.

This is what caused the Original Gravity of Pilseners to drop first below 13°P and then below 12°P. Just do the math: say that you are a big German brewer producing 3 million hectoliters annually at 12.5°P OG (the 12 degrees Plato tax rate), you pay 28.332 million Euros in beer tax. If the OG is 11.2°P (the 11 degrees Plato tax rate), you pay 25.971 million Euros and you have just saved 2.361 million Euros in beer tax. So stay well below the 12°P level (samples are taken by the government from the breweries to confirm this) and you will enjoy the lower tax bracket. Unfortunately, every little decrease in the OG has a deleterious effect on the body and complexity of the resulting beer and the IBU´s (bitterness) must be dropped to compensate for this as well.

Now for the truth: despite the revised beer tax law in 1993, German beer tax is still very, very low and the third lowest in all of Europe. Take a look at that PDF cited above and see what brewers are paying in Scandinavia and the UK. Thinking of opening a brewery in Norway? Be prepared to cut huge checks to the government. In Germany, despite the change in the beer tax law, there was only one real reason to decrease the OG´s of Pilseners: somebody in accounting figured out that they could save millions on taxes by doing so. So they hauled the brewmasters into the conference room and told them to get that OG down! Kaiserdom Pilsener (Bamberg) is already down to 10.6°P. Look for the others to follow. Would somebody in Germany please start a Campaign for Real Pilsener!

 

I hope someone does. I try to advocate for traditional styles as much as I can. Right now, however, most people seem more interested in seeing every country instead adopt U.S.-style hopping levels/varietals....

 

I realize that this is one of your major qualms, Herr Burgess, and I get it. Honestly I do. In regards to the pilsner thread discussion, I think back to a trade off I had with some German brewers: show me your pilsner, and I already know your recipe. 95% pilsner malt, maybe 5% Munich, a 60 minute bitter addition, a 15 minute flavor addition and German lager yeast. If you are small, maybe even a flame-out addition works for you. And then it comes down to technique, but with modified malts, chances are pretty good that if you work cleanly and smart, you can create a decent pils. Sure, there are lots of quality differences for the discerning palate, but let's be honest: most folks don't taste the "feine Unterschiede" that you and other BAs might, or they just don't care.

I would like to know that more people are interested in better beer, maybe even supporting their local brewery as opposed to the conglomerate, but the Germans are just not "there" yet. They believe now that ALL pilsners are fairly decent (see Reinheitsgebot discussion), especially considering the price point. Maybe the oddball styles which many are tooling with are at least a gateway to making the beer, and not the price, more interesting.

 

Oddball styles haven't pushed many American brewers to brew a better pils though, just a hoppier one. Of course there's always exceptions.

Maybe because Germany has deeper roots in brewing great pilsners it will be different. Personally I've found once the general public tastes hops, they want more of them. And brewers will quickly (and intelligently) oblige. Most palates prefer citra hops over pils malt.